Take Me Fishing

A few months ago, The Recreational Boating & Fishing Foundation (RBFF) launched a new campaign and website with the help of Colle+McVoy. I’m totally in love and impressed with the site even though I’m not the biggest fishing fan. I’m also impressed that they’ve continued to expand and add to the site. I really like the Phased approach they’ve taken with the project. Why not start crawling today vs. waiting a year to sprint?

The newest phase in the project is the addition of Fishington, a boating and fishing social community. I have to admit, I’m a little skeptical of it… I’ve always been a believer that you have to connect with people where they already are, not force them to create an upteenth social networking profile. However, because the content and demographic is so unique, I think it just might work.

Of course, people are never happy with stuff, so here’s some things I wish they’d change:

• – For the love of god, please let me hide my age! There should be an option to show birth date, but not the year.
• – Allow me to rearrange my profile boxes. If I’m more interested in Hot Spots, I should be able to move those towards the top or to the right hand side.
• – For the most part, I love the profile completion bar that gives you “points” for completing different parts of your profile. At heart, people are competitive. If they can easily get to 100% vs. 50% they will. By adding this feature, it encourages people to keep adding to their profile and returning to the site. However, you only get percentage points for following the instructions underneath the staus bar. For example, the first time I signed on, it said, “Add a HotSpot. Will add 8%.” While I didn’t add a HotSpot, I added pictures. My completion rate stayed at 43%. The next time I signed in, it said, “Add Media. Will add 8%.” Once again, I didn’t follow instructions; I added a HotSpot instead, remembering I would get an additional 8%. But, after adding a HotSpot, my profile completion stayed at 43%
• – While I love being able to add pictures and videos, I wish the feature was faster to use. You can only add one picture at a time and you MUST add a description. Wow! What a pain. I’d love to add pictures in bulk. I’d also love to group my pictures into photo albums. And most importantly, I want options! Don’t force me to add a description if I don’t want to.
• – Adding a profile picture is slightly awkward. Most social media sites automatically resize your image to fit. Fishington doesn’t. Hmmm… cancel upload and go back, I’ll resize the picture myself. Unfortunately, the site doesn’t give you the dimensions to do this.
• – While I love the idea of searching for HotSpots, the tool (at least for me) is difficult and frustrating to use. I like that you can add your favorite HotSpots to your profile, but I can’t add more than one at a time. Once I add one, I have to start the process of finding HotSpots from the VERY beginning. More often than not, several favorite HotSpots show up on the first search. Once I favorite one, I should be taken back to the previous screen vs. having to start the search all over again.
• – I know it just launched, but I think it’s important to tie all your social media efforts together… i.e. actively promote this on the Take Me Fishing Facebook Fan page, on the YouTube Channel, etc. and then vice versa. You have to go where your customers currently are. Not where you want them to be.
• – On a random note, I’m surprised that the website pulls in the YouTube videos vs. hosting them. YouTube is one site that most corporations block. Hosting the videos allows everyone to see them. Including a link to YouTube allows everyone to easily share, favorite, comment, etc. if they choose.

And a few things I love:

• – I totally love the homepage video of the RBFF President/CEO endorsing and explaining the community. WOW! Really impressed that he did this. It also puts a face to RBFF. I imagine he appeals to the larger demographic. For me, he reminds me of my Grandpa, who taught me how to fish.
• – I love and hate the openness / non-privacy all at the same time. I think for this community it works and is needed to connect people with common interests.
• – I’m jazzed that the site actually keeps me signed in indefinitely. Everything else usually kicks me out after two weeks and remembering my logins and passwords can sometimes be a pain.
• – Totally love the whole Angler’s Legacy feature. Although, it might be interesting if it showed how many other people had taken the pledge (a la Nike+). I think it would encourage more sign ups and a better sense of community (as long as enough people have taken the pledge )

Can’t wait to see what the next phase of this brings!